Tender Victory

The plot is enough to grab you: a minister named John Fletcher finds five children in post-WW II Europe who have all been victims in concentration camps. These "wolf children" were moments from certain death by an angry mob before Fletcher intervenes and rescues them. Though they are unfit for society, as damaged as they are in health and mind, the minister takes them in and adopts them as his own.

Upon returning to the United States, Fletcher has a hard time finding a post in a church because of people's intolerance to these savage children. Though these people claim to be good Christians, they have a hard time accepting those different from their own. These people are shown to be so sheltered in their own safe and happy world in the United States that they have a hard time facing the atrocities of "foreigners" faced in war. One point for Taylor Caldwell, I thought as I read, and figured what happened then could certainly apply to the present. Only it grew more ridiculous at this point as John Fletcher manipulates the sensibilities of these close-minded people and forces them to face what they did not want to see.

The book is basically John's fight for tolerance and understanding, and it's a nice point of view, but it was unbelievable to me how easily the people in this book were swayed to see the other side of the coin. You cannot falter so easily from one opinion to the other. It shows a wonderful faith in people, but realistically we aren't so keen on expanding our views, not due to one lecture, anyway.

There were too many coincidences in this book, too many pretty packages tied with bows, and while tragedy struck towards the end of the book, you couldn't help but wonder how someone who mourned so violently would or could recover so quickly and find faith in mankind, even when it involved the death of a loved one at the hands of human cruelty.

It was a lovely little book to read, but I couldn't help rolling my eyes in certain places, especially when Minister John went on another soul-saving, view-changing-of-the-mindless mission.

Do I recommend this book? Yes, but with the premises of the novel it could have been so much more. More plot, more character depth, a meatier romance, a dirtier view of the atrocities these children faced, and certainly a lot less lecturing. ( )